By Phil Mattera, Dirt Diggers Digest
There is so much corporate misbehavior taking place around us that it
is possible to lose one’s sense of outrage. But every so often a
company comes along that is so brazen in its misdeeds that it quickly
restores our indignation.
Massey Energy is one of those companies. Evidence is piling up suggesting that corporate negligence and an
obsession with productivity above all else were responsible for the
horrendous explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia that
killed 29 workers.
This is not the first time Massey has been accused of such behavior.
In 2008 a Massey subsidiary had to pay a record $4.2 million to settle federal
criminal and civil charges of willful violation of mandatory safety
standards in connection with a 2006 mine fire that caused the deaths of
two workers in West Virginia.
Lax safety standards are far
from Massey’s only sin. The unsafe conditions are made possible in
part by the fact that Massey has managed to deprive nearly all its
miners of union representation. That includes the workers at Upper Big
Branch, who were pressured by management to vote against the United Mine
Workers of America (UMWA) during organizing drives in 1995 and 1997. As
of the end of 2009, only 76 out of the company’s 5,851 employees were
members of the UMWA.
Massey CEO Don Blankenship (photo) flaunts his anti-union animus.
It’s how he made his corporate bones. Back in 1984 Blankenship, then the
head of a Massey subsidiary, convinced top management to end its
practice of adhering to the industry-wide collective bargaining
agreements that the major coal operators negotiated with the UMWA. After
the union called a strike, the company prolonged the dispute by
employing harsh tactics. The walkout, marked by violence on both sides,
lasted 15 months.
In the years that followed, Massey phased out its unionized
operations, got rid of union members when it took over new mines and
fought hard against UMWA organizing drives. Without union work rules,
Massey has had an easier time cutting corners on safety.
Massey has shown a similar disregard for the well-being of the
communities in which it operates. The company’s environmental record is
abysmal. In 2000 a poorly designed waste dam at a Massey facility in
Martin County, Kentucky collapsed, releasing some 250 million gallons of toxic sludge.
The spill, larger than the infamous Buffalo Creek flood of 1972,
contaminated 100 miles of rivers and streams and forced the governor to
declare a 10-county state of emergency.
This and a series of smaller spills in 2001 caused such resentment
that the UMWA and environmental groups — not normally the closest of
allies — came together to denounce the company. In 2002 UMWA President
Cecil Roberts was arrested at a demonstration protesting the spills.
In 2008 Massey had to pay a record $20 million civil penalty to resolve federal charges
that its operations in West Virginia and Kentucky had violated the
Clean Water Act more than 4,000 times.
And to top it off, Blankenship is a global warming denier.
Massey is one of those corporations that has apparently concluded
that it is far more profitable to defy the law and pay the price. What
it gains from flouting safety standards, labor protections and
environmental safeguards far outweighs even those record penalties that
have been imposed. At the same time, Massey’s track record is so bad
that it seems to be impervious to additional public disgrace.
Faced with an outlaw company such as Massey, perhaps it is time for
us to resurrect the idea of a corporate death penalty, otherwise known
as charter revocation. If corporations are to have rights, they should
also have responsibilities — and should face serious consequences when
they violate those responsibilities in an egregious way.